Vitale signs with ESPN through 2028

Dick Vitale is inextricably intertwined with college basketball, with his iconic voice, exuberant style and enthusiastic catchphrases melding into a soundtrack for nearly five decades of the sport's history. And the broadcasting great's influence is sticking around next season, too, both in person on game days and through an addition to the college basketball calendar named in his honor. ESPN announced Monday that Vitale has signed a contract through the 2027-28 season, while ESPN Events is launching the Dick Vitale Invitational — the first matchup being a season-opening tilt between Duke and Texas on Nov. 4 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Fittingly, the announcement comes on the 86th birthday of the affectionately known "Dickie V," and months after Vitale returned to the airwaves after being gone for two years amid a fourth battle with cancer. The Basketball Hall of Famer, also a former college and NBA coach, has been with ESPN since its 1979 launch and called the network's first college basketball broadcast. "So many times, awards and honors come to people after they're long gone," Vitale said in an interview with The Associated Press. "And to get it while you're living is just a great, great feeling." Vitale's career is built around his zeal for college basketball, one familiar for fans who have grown up watching games called by Vitale. "I think for a lot of people, he represents the voice of the sport," said Clint Overby, vice president of ESPN Events. "For a lot people he embodies all that's great about the sport." Overby said discussions about a Vitale-named event had been tossed around going back years, with conversations reaching Vitale in recent months in what Vitale called "a shock." After the Duke-Texas game, Overby said, ESPN Events will evaluate how the Invitational will evolve with scheduling, and even the potential to involve multiple nights in multiple cities. Overby believes it's a worthy tribute to the man who welcomed him to college basketball as Overby watched games on TV while growing up in Wisconsin. "I'd turn on a late-night basketball game and he would be there," Overby said. "So for a lot of years, he was kind of my window into that world." Vitale sounds eager to get back to courtside this fall, calling it "the best medicine in the world" to join partners like Dave O'Brien and Dan Shulman.